I don’t tweet or tumbl or any of that stuff, so I don’t really have a place to put this besides here. Nor can I contact websites like Animal Liberation Frontline or NAALPO due to my legal issues. But this ridiculous article about how we need to do away with ALF supporters has been heavy on my mind. So I thought I would share my thoughts. Feel free to share on your social media outlets if you feel inspired to:

While I share in the anonymous author’s desire to see more action and less talk, the arguments laid out in their article are tragically flawed, dangerous, and counterproductive (and somewhat laughable as it is being posted on blogs and all things social media, thus creating just the opposite affect of the original argument). I have spent awhile thinking about and being angered over the article and how best to respond. Ultimately, my own personal story, which I think is fairly commonplace for a lot of us, was the best rebuttal:

I think my story is pretty typical for anyone coming up in the mid 90′s. I moved to the Northwest in 1995 when I was 19. I quickly became vegan and interested in politics. I didn’t know any other activists or even vegans at the time. However, I found myself captivated by hardcore and punk music, and zines that espoused the lifestyle. I would go to places like Fallout Records and dig through the dusty box they had in the corner, full of old magazines. Here I would find old Sea Shepherd journals and issues of The Underground (the ALF Supporters Group newsletter). I would go to hardcore shows and pick up literature at tables. I spent hours in used bookstores digging through the history sections for books on radical activism. I would spend days pouring over these materials, reading and rereading them, and dreaming and scheming.

Eventually I would find my way into my local animal rights group. I worked with the Northwest Animal Rights Network in Seattle that was a mix of the greatest group of people. Our tight-knit core group of 10 or so had retired naval lawyers in their 70s down to punk rock teens with mohawks. But the one thing we all had in common was that we unabashedly supported the ALF. One of the first demonstrations I ever went to was an ALF support demo after a local Honey Bee Ham restaurant had its windows smashed in. Myself and a friend started passing out information on animal rights and animal liberation at the local hardcore shows. We would be doing tables upwards of 3-4 times a week. There wasn’t much in the way of ALF support merchandise at the time, so we screened pro-ALF shirts and hoodies we got from the thrift store and sold them to cover the costs of photocopies. While I certainly don’t attribute it entirely or even remotely to the two of us, there was definitely a genuine feeling of support for direct action and the ALF within the community.

Over the next several years I would redirect my focus from simple protests to civil disobedience, to direct action in the form of whale hunt sabs off the coast of Washington, to helping get the SHAC USA office off the ground and working on the anti-HLS campaign for 5 years. During that time I also worked on and helped start some of the biggest and most important direct action support magazines of those times. Those magazines would help build, among other things, community support for imprisoned activists around the world. That support would come in many forms, including leaflets and magazines, t shirts, videos, benefits, and support funds. Eventually myself and 5 friends would be found guilty in the SHAC 7 trial. I would be sentenced to 48 months in federal prison, partly because we chose to publicly share ideas. Controversial ideas, like supporting direct action and the ALF.

All of this started with zines I found in a box in the corner of a record store. It led to high-fives with friends, wearing black shirts and taking goofy pictures with disposable cameras at hardcore shows (that’s what we did before Instagram). I started out as a kid listening to music and reading propaganda. I never was a press officer, or a convicted (or not convicted) operative, nor am I disabled. But I think I’ve accomplished some really exciting things in my 17 years as an activist – from getting fur out of major retailers in Seattle, to using direct action to stop the killing of whales off the coast of Washington to organizing with SHAC USA, one of the most successful grassroots animal rights campaigns in our history. And I started out exactly as the kid you are saying needs to stop their “madness”.

Do you know who else started out the same way I did? Being inspired by listening to the music you want to end and reading the zines (now online, called blogs) you would like to do away with? ALF activists like Rod Coronado, Keith Mann, Peter Young. Andy Stepanian, Darius Fullmer. Do you know how ALL of those folks survived their prison experiences? By receiving books and letters and photos and donations by all those people who you suggest do nothing more than “work and watch movies with friends”.

The bottom line is, for over 40 years there has been ALF support work going on all over the world. (Please learn the history of that work at Conflict Gypsy) That work has created a community of people that might not be exactly what you want them to be, but ultimately will support those people you revere so much when they need it the most. Their simple presence will keep that community around, will foster that support when its needed, and keep the issues as relevant as possible. Of course we want more action, less words. But ultimately we need both, because that’s what will keep these ideologies going throughout the peaks and the troughs, the highs and the lows. To not show your support publicly for direct action is what may be the final blow to one of the most important elements of the animal rights movement.

This week I received an anonymous article, which I am posting below. It is signed “an anonymous liberator”. There is no way to verify the authenticity of the author as being a “liberator” or ever having carried out an Animal Liberation Front action. However there is a tenor to this article that is hard to fake.

This article calls out a particular form of imposter: those who exploit the risk and sacrifices of the ALF (and others) to increase their social status. Specifically, a subculture of aspiring scene celebrities and keyboard gangsters who build a social identity around ‘supporting’ the ALF.

This takes many forms, from ALF t-shirt-wearing by those who have never lifted a finger to help animals to “militant” blogs written by those who leave their computers only to go to restaurants or anarchist meetings.

The messages of this article are long overdue:

1) Those who use use the animal liberation movement to look cool need to start helping animals or be shown the door.

2) There is no such thing as “supporting the ALF”. The ALF doesn’t need “support” – it needs participation.

This is the article, in full:

DO NOT SUPPORT THE ANIMAL LIBERATION FRONT by one anonymous liberator

The Animal Liberation Front is in desperate need of fewer supporters. It has far, far too many, and the madness has to stop somewhere.

The supporters are legion in their black t-shirts – tapping away at laptops, surfing crowds at shows, bussing tables at the local vegan eatery, distributing zines. Thousands of them share their support every day on Facebook and Tumblr. They post and re-post, like and comment. They are ever proliferating.

But, sadly, while all of this reaches new heights in the frenzy of the internet, the underground is largely at a standstill in the real world. ALF support, at one point a recruiting mechanism subservient to the action that it helped empower, has now become the main event. So, since it no longer serves its purpose, it is kindly but firmly requested that you abandon your support.

Take off your t-shirts – here is the wake up call. If you are able-bodied and you have built an entire social identity around ‘supporting’ sabotage and liberation, you are now required to go out and do those things. Your support will not be missed. You will no longer be able to hold on to the comfortable fiction that it ever mattered in the first place. And you will not be able to speak about your nighttime activities, so you will miss out on scene points.

But you will be able to relish accomplishments far more meaningful than anything you could ever do on Instagram or at a show. When you are old and your tattoos have faded, these memories will still be clear. You will be able to make a true and direct impact in the midst of a cold and vast system. And you will be able to look a creature in the eyes and save her life. For those who truly believe, it will be no sacrifice to change roles and take risks in order to keep alive this thing they hold so dear. It takes no specialized skill, only common sense and courage.

Perhaps, as a community, it is time for us to start changing our lifestyles through a new collective paradigm. If you are a self-identified ‘radical’ who spends their life going to work and watching movies with friends, the only thing currently separating you from the average American is ideas. This must no longer be acceptable.

We cannot explicitly speak about, and thus cannot socially reinforce, a culture of underground activity. However, we certainly can build a “culture of crime,” whereby we encourage not only disrespect (easy and functionally irrelevant) but disregard for the law. Jaywalk, shoplift, trespass, whatever – get acquainted with ignoring the rules as a way of life. Start in an area where you feel comfortable, get your friends doing it, and then put what you learn to use in the dead of night.

Accompany this with a culture of institutional privacy – encryption for casual conversation, proxy web surfing, releasing ourselves from the need to share every move we make on social media. While it is most important that individuals take action, these collective steps might be useful.

As for those who do not change, who continue to post their blogs or write their songs, they should not be given the respect or recognition that they seek. It is not respectable to align oneself in words with a phenomenon based on action. And when one gains social clout from doing so, it is parasitic, or at the very least cowardly. It contributes to an activist culture where such inaction is somehow a reasonable, even honorable, manner of behavior.
While others offer liberation and risk prison time, these individuals offer ‘support’ and risk too many high-fives. But those whose support is only as good as their own comfort can keep both.

Press officers, convicted operatives, and the disabled can continue to speak up for the ALF. If actions surge to an all-time high, but no one is sharing the news on Facebook, the animals won’t mind. They do not care about our theories, ideas, beliefs, or our drama. They are in desperate need of fewer supporters and more actors.

If your support for the Animal Liberation Front is genuine, it will end tonight.

People all over the world are taking their protest to the streets fighting for their rights and freedom to overturn the current conditions. But why not here? The German reality is marked by social exclusion and cuts in the supply of basic essentials. Simultaneously, the media is brainwashing people’s mind against every existing resistance that criticises this inhuman oppression by the state and capital. It isn’t just the police who beat us up or arrest us and it isn’t just the political legislative which establishes laws to enslave us. Also responsible are those people who are not offering resistance to this situation and those who are making it possible through their ever-so-important (wage-) labour so that the “machinery of administration” runs smoothly. This machinery kills in agreement with German bureaucracy whether on the street or from one’s desk. Silence gives consent. We don’t know why hardly anyone says “Stop!”. Maybe it is because it is not yet bad enough for people or is it just the result of a traditional submissiveness resulting from centuries of monarchist and subsequently fascist leadership, which is burnt in people’s brains. There are nearly no noteworthy protests in Germany against the current shitty situation. That’s a fact. For sure, there are demonstrations which are sometimes joined by a quarter of a million people but the majority of these people, most of whom are members of parties and unions, are therefore directly responsible for what is going on here. Besides, these people are not willing to fight for real changes. Just complain and that’s all. Real changes would mean the loss of one’s own social rank and of all the privileges with which some people have made themselves damn comfortable. For example, economical privileges that exist because other parts of the world were continually ransacked. These conditions have been maintained for a long time with brutal force.

Why we don’t demand anything!

It makes no sense to go to a government with a list of demands. You cannot hope to find sympathetic ears in a political system which puts power into the hands of politicians who are not even elected by a quarter of the people. They will not listen to concerns dealing with people’s lives but will instead focus on issues with capitalistic relevance. That is why it makes absolutely no sense for us present a list of demands to a government.

We do not have to submit to the rule of those who want to control us!

We do not have to degrade ourselves by pleading and begging!

We have to make sure that the things we don’t like do not exist any more!

It is absolutely possible for us to live a self-determined life. But this will only work if the wish to be ruled and to rule is destroyed, if the state’s repressive apparatus is smashed, if the government is overturned, if the “cop-in-your-head” is killed and to break free from your self-imposed boundaries. Afterwards it will be possible to replace the logic of capitalistic values with collective self-organisation. A fight against the system has to be a part of our everyday life, as anti-hierarchical as possible and we have to show solidarity to one another.

Insurrection Days

For many people it is difficult to find access, to organise themselves and to act beyond their own borders. We want to give you an opportunity to get to know one another, to create networks, to fight together and to learn from each other. Together we want to try to take the initiative and to create a climate of insecurity and fear for the state and social authorities, at least for a couple of days. Its aim is to shock the normative structure of the state and social authorities, consequently to question the state’s monopoly on violence. On May Day the police know where and when it could kick-off and were well organised in recent years. However the nights and days before should be defined by us. Sometimes colourful but also in black. Sometimes peaceful and decisive but also with fiery rage.

“For now there is no movement that positions itself radically against Technology, neither organized nor solid, if some day there is (if it triumphs and we are alive) then we will accept our mistake, in the meantime we will not accept futurist speculations that bet on a movement that helps to destabilize the system in its totality. Those who believe in the uprising of such an anti-technology movement can keep hoping or can put all their strength into that task. It seems that some have not realized that in speaking of a “sufficiently strong and organized anti-technology movement” they are also entering into the language of leftism.”

The following text is intended to be a self-critique, in addition to accepting publicly the mistakes that we made in past communiques and in claiming responsibility for some attempts against the Techno-industrial System.

Certainly, ITS will always accept critiques that are based in reason, those that are not founded upon strong and well-cemented criteria will be rejected as has been done before.

I

ITS considers it to have been an error in past communiques to substitute the letters that denote gender with an “x” since we do not focus on things like this, nor do we want to denote a certain inclination to the linguistic postures of the politically correct. And we say that we do not focus on these kinds of grammatical currents because the attack on the system is our view, and no other struggle. Generally, those people who write with these kinds of corrections have roots in their postulated senseless struggles like “equality,” “solidarity,” “egalitarianism” (etc), that is, they defend the ideology of leftism and reductionism, which we do not share. It is for this reason that we reject this kind of “grammatical subculture” (as it is called).

II

Many of the things that we have written in the first as well as the second communique–such as the supposed liberation of animals and the earth, which are based in sentimentalism, insurrectionalism, which in many cases justifies itself with emotions of vengeance, the poor choice that we had with the thing about the earthquakes, the critique that one must see with respect to the poor interpretations of some ideas of Ted Kaczynski (truthfully speaking, very few)–we have discarded and now for us they have no validity. The lack of more printed material that correctly explains, or at least has a certain closeness to, Kaczynski’s ideas does not make the task of understanding them with clarity easy for many.

Obviously, we continue to defend the critique against the terminology “revolution-revolutionary,” without a doubt.

Because:

– The so-called “revolution” that so many bet on perverts the nature of the human being because it always tends to reform the system.

– “Revolution” is a blind hope (faith) that many want to see achieved, if they do not achieve their task (which has never been done) their efforts will be in vain, and everything, absolutely everything for which they fought will sell them short, making such efforts useless.

– “Revolution” is a leftist concept.

– Many leftists want to make from their puposes and/or approaches something so profound that they exaggerate themselves, digress and come to limits outside of reality. There are many examples: “the destruction of capitalism,” “a world without states or borders,” “a planet without animal exploitation,” “world peace,” and among others the so-called “anti-technology revolution.”

The struggle against the Techno-industrial System is not a game which we should win or lose, defeat or be defeated, that is what many have still not understood and it seems that many are still expecting to be “recompensated” in the future for the current actions of “revolutionaries.” One must accept that many things in life are not recompensated, that many tasks and/or ends are never achieved (including Autonomy) and the destruction of the techno-system by the work of the “revolutionaries” is one of them. Now there is not time to wait for the imminent collapse, for those who want to take their time as if technological progress is not growing by leaps and bounds and devouring our sphere of individual Freedom little by little. We are the generation that has seen technological progress grow before our eyes, the specialization of nano-bio-technology in various fields of civilized non-life, the creation and marketing of graphene (a), nuclear disasters such as in Fukushima, accelerated environmental deterioration, the growth of biometrics (b), the qualitative and quantitative expansion of artificial intelligence, bioinformatics, neuroeconomics, etc. That is why ITS sees in terms of what is tangible, palpable and immediate, and that immediate is the attack with all necessary resources, time and intelligence against this system. We are individualities in the process of achieving our Freedom and Autonomy, within an optimal environment, and together with it we attack the system that quite clearly wants us in cages, obeying our wild human instincts. With this we apply ourselves as individuals in affinity to try to keep ourselves as distant as possible from leftist and civilized concepts, practices and ideologizing.

That is our real purpose, what we seek, and not an unreal dream with irrational tintings and full of speculations.

For now there is no movement that positions itself radically against Technology, neither organized nor solid, if some day there is (if it triumphs and we are alive) then we will accept our mistake, in the meantime we will not accept futurist speculations that bet on a movement that helps to destabilize the system in its totality. Those who believe in the uprising of such an anti-technology movement can keep hoping or can put all their strength into that task. It seems that some have not realized that in speaking of a “sufficiently strong and organized anti-technology movement” they are also entering into the language of leftism.

III

Now, we have become aware of an increase of discourse against Civilization in claims of responsibility for actions that are poorly directed and useless with respect to the point of reference (against the Techno-industrial System). One must take into account that the critique in a communique against Civilization or against Technology does not do anything if the action is not effective and well-aimed against these.

This “fashion” (to call it such) has been expanding year after year, we believe because the ideas against civilized progress have spread greatly through the internet and other media.

If we turn to look at history, we would realize that the same thing has happened before and after the arrest of the Unabomber in 1996, we remember the pathetic campaign that was initiated in those years called “Unabomber for president” (c), and the emergence of the Earth Liberation Front in the United States (d), and while the individuals coming together in that group were for years the strongest domestic terrorism threat in that country, nevertheless the majority of their discourses were carried on the path of sentimentalism, irrationalism and biocentrism. In other words the “radical environmentalist” fashion was popular those years, as the “anti-civilization fashion” is now. But it is worth remembering with this that every wave or fashion ends some day, and only those who have well established the critique against the Techno-industrial System will keep the same path, over the years what has to happen will happen, and the things that have to occur will occur.

We are aware that ITS has been responsibile in large part for this “fashion” having grown in great proportion, we accept this mistake, and what we want to do (for now) is only to wait for those individuals who have copied our discourse and have mutated it, to stop doing so, or for them to recognize, accept and take on the critique with these kinds of texts not only because we have made it but also because it is absolutely necessary to reject the deceptive leftism and attack the Techno-industrial System in a congruent and radical manner (if that is what the intended objective is, of course).

IV

We have analyzed these questions to the source and it seems that for the moment there are two important parts within the struggle against the Techno-industrial System.

To summarize we will put it thusly: there are those who question and critique the system and others who not only do this but also attack, like ITS (e).

Faced with this, the critical and not active part (that is to say the part that doesn’t place in its sights the attack against the system by means of violence) will always say that what the ideas against Technology and Civilization need least is to be related with those tactics. Which we do not share. The majority of these people (anti-civilization, primitivists, salon “anti-technology revolutionaries,” etc) speak of destroying the system but feel an apparent fear in seeing that the ideas are related to the attacks on the same system that they want to destroy.

Sooner or later, through ourselves and through others, the ideas against the Techno-industrial System and/or Society will relate themselves with attempts and acts of violence, undoubtedly.

V

With respect to our position that has to do with the war against leftism. We have reevaluated what we said before and we have analyzed that leftism is just a factor that deseves only rejection, critique, and the distancing of those of us who fight against the Industrial Technological System, nothing more. We made the effort to send an incendiary package to Greenpeace Mexico (f), another package of similar characteristics to the leftist director the the Milenio paper in Mexico City in November 2011 (Francisco D. Gonzales), and an explosive package to the leftist director of the same paper in its office in the city of León, Guanajuato in December 2011 (Pablo Cesar Carrillo). But in seeing our mistake, we have ceased these attacks and now focus all our efforts for the frontal attack against the Techno-industrial System.

The leftists can kill one another, or can be “victims” of the state and its apparatuses of control (as has traditionally happened), but not by us anymore. We will not stain our hands with their dirty blood, nor will we persist in attempting against their lives since there are more important and certain targets than their dispicable lives.

We know our tactics, to speak of leftists is one of them, we know what we do and that is all.

VI

ITS’ actions and its discourses are an attack in every sense of the word, and that is why we utilize offensive language against those who make the system keep functioning.

Technologists, leftists and the Techno-industrial Society in general do not deserve flowers nor good treatment, they deserve hard critique; which will be uncomfortable for some (and in truth, we do not consider our language exaggerated, we have never written with high-sounding or highly vulgar words since by our criteria if we utilize them then we discredit our ideas).

We are a group of radical environmentalists who carry out attempts against the physical integrity of persons specializing in developing, maintaining and improving the system that reduces us to artificialization; we are not a group of critics of the cafe who hold themselves solely in theorizations, if we were then we would watch our language a little.

We decided to publish this in order to dispel all doubt with respect to what motivates us to carry out acts of violence against the technologists, since one will surely say that the way we refer to these people shows a supposed lack of self-control in our emotions, or that we are motivated by psychological necessities based in feelings of hostility. Which we do not share in the least. ITS bases its attacks (as we have already stated before [g]) on reason and on instincts.

We critique by reason and we act by instinct, the two go hand-in-hand, one serves us for deeply analyzing and critiquing what is presently happening and the other serves us to attack in a frontal way without any compassion and rejecting any consideration of Civilization’s pseudo-morality.

We said it in our first communique and we repeat it again:

“Because although some elements within Civilization tell us that we have been domesticated for years biologically, we nevertheless continue to have Wild Instincts that we hurl in defense of the whole of which we are a part — the Earth.”

Unlike many others, ITS does not hate this system, nor do we base our actions and discourses on sentiments like vengeance, frustration, hate and/or desperation (even though some want us to accept that), as we have already said, what moves us is reason and instinct, the defense of Wild Nature (including human) and consequently Freedom and Autonomy. Do not dig deeper, because you will not find more than that, since those are our real motivations.

VII

With all that said, ITS makes itself responsible for the following attempts against the Techno-industrial System:

– August 28, 2011: Attempt on CINVESTAV (Center of Research and Advanced Studies [of the National Polytechnic Institute]) in the municipality of Irapuato in Guanajuato. The objective was all of the researchers-biotechnologists who were working and studying in that place, but because the Mexican army intervened, the attempt was frustrated.

– November 2011: Threat on Dr. Manuel Torres Labansat director of the Institute of Physics of UNAM (Autonomous National University of Mexico) and on the director of scientific research Carlos Aramburo of HOZ in Mexico City. The package contained a .380 caliber bullet along with a threat from ITS, part of which read:

“[…] As we have shown in our previous communiques, the system would not be the same without mathematicians, physicists, researchers and other technoswill like YOU (and by YOU we refer to you, to the researcher Carlos Aramburo of HOZ and to those who work in the Institute of Physics), that is why when YOU are determined to create nanoscience and carry out technological projects that attempt against Wild Nature (including the human), we place ourselves in its defense and we attack.

“Without any doubt, YOU are a key component for the system, those who have the technical and intellectual knowledge for perverting the ecosystems on this Earth where we try to develop. YOU modify matter for the creation of a life totally dependent on Technology, which will lead us and is leading us to self-destruction. The Reality is this, the more animal and human species that are domesticated, the more disastrous will be the consequences of using all possible means to keep that modern “stability” on its feet.

Planet Earth already has enough with urbanization, deforestation, contamination, wars that affect the natural equilibrium, ecological epidemics, oil spills (and more) for YOU to come and hypocritically try to help it, as if to undo the damage that we have done depends on the pathetic altruistic scientists, as if something is helped by saying that YOU develop nanoscience and advanced technologies for the “well-being” of humanity and of the Earth.

In no way do we pretend to change the way of thinking of a civilized person, an alienated person, one who graduated from the Faculty of Sciences at UNAM and who received a doctorate at the University of Oxford some years ago. Something brought your studies to the maximum point, there is some reason you are where you are, but we have news for you, what you have lived is nothing more than a life absorbed by the system, which will pay you very little.

This is a direct threat against your person and all the researchers and department heads who hide themselves between four walls tending toward the Domination of all that is potentially free. This is only a warning, it will cost us nothing to leave an explosive package in your facilities […]

As you must have realized, Mr. Manuel, this package carries with it a bullet, which can symbolize many things: detonation, explosion, wounds, terror, force, gunpowder, death. But now we use it to symbolize the material that we will use to puncture your head and/or those of your colleagues […]”

– December 8, 2011: Package with incendiary charge for the director of research Marcela Villafaña of the Polytechnic University of Pachuca in the municipality of Zempoala in Hidalgo. In the attempt an academic who opened the package was wounded, a story similar to our first attack in April 2011 at the UPVM (Polytechnic University of the Valley of Mexico) in the State of Mexico.

“Our lives are at stake and we will not renounce any weapon that we can use as our own.”- Anonymous

In regards to the brief history of the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), an organization which has brought much inspiration to the North American context and drawn significant media attention, I would like to present a few points in order to critique, clarify and highlight the ways the ELF can be understood as a methodology instead of as an ideology. At the end of this piece, a proposal is drawn out for anarchists to develop their own actions separately in cells, groups or any informal structure they see fit whether or not these are aligned with the “ELF guidelines”.

Obviously this is something that is difficult, because on the one hand the ELF does exist as an organization but is also made up of many dispersed cells and individuals. So the critique will follow the ELF guidelines and not critique the individuals themselves.

An Ideology: Single issue and lobbying with dynamite.

“The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor.”- Albert Camus, “The Myth of Sisyphus”

The reasons that the ELF proposes for doing actions is something I would like to question. These guidelines state:

To cause maximum economic damage to a given entity that is profiting off the destruction of the natural environment.

To educate the public on the atrocities committed against the environment and life.

To take all necessary precautions against harming life.

The guidelines are very similar to the goals of the ELF with one major exception. The third of three guidelines states that one must take all necessary precautions against harming life. The ELF considers itself a nonviolent organization as no physical harm has come to a human as a result of the group’s actions. This is by no means a sheer coincidence but in fact a commitment to the guidelines. Individuals interested in becoming active in the ELF need to follow the above guidelines and create their own close knit anonymous cell made up of trustworthy and sincere people. Remember the ELF and each cell within it is anonymous not only to one another but also to the general public. So there is not a realistic chance of becoming active in an already existing cell. Take initiative, form your own cell and do what needs to be done to protect all life on the planet! 1

Since they put the Earth before their decision as conscious individuals,2 a psychosis, a martyrdom complex for the Earth, begins to develop. This is similar to how most of the left today functions, by feeding a psychological need for self-justification in everyday life. When for example activists put so much energy into certain types of actions (petitions, lock downs, passive sit ins, etc.), for all the right and justified reasons for doing so and not seeing the desired results, they become hopeless in their own actions. I think it is important to have a sense of individual intention and self-motivation, rather than becoming blind to reasons for acting against the world around oneself. By blind I mean not having the ability to not see beyond the ways one is making decisions upon what actions to take and see the cause and effect of those actions. This blindness constructs a martyrdom complex similar to that of Sisyphus, who rolled the rock up a mountain day after day. This tunnel vision is caused by focusing solely on the theater of political affairs while neglecting the rest of life.

Having this type of perception about one’s own reality can create something similar to what is called a “single issue campaign”. Only in this case instead of doing tree sits like Earth First!, an individual or a group is setting incendiary devices to call upon the “unjust actions” of some company. When the company itself has no interest to change the reasons that it exists, it purely becomes a moral battle between the “just” and “unjust” – speaking truth to power when power has no interest in listening. This becomes an endless pursuit for some sad form of change.

The ELF in its FAQ’s claims to not follow a leadership or central hierarchy, but an ideology. I would question the use of an ideology, instead proposing the use of a particular methodology that is anarchist in practice. Once an individual begins to believe in an ideology they put it – the ideology – above themselves, acting only in accordance with that ideology, weighing the rights and wrongs of a certain course of action. This can be seen in the mentality of leftists, Christians, Catholics, vegans and anyone who adheres to an ideology through belief or action.

There is no ethical equation toward the understanding of how “we as society need to change capitalism”, where by acting in accordance with the state and one’s morals we see how things can become equal within the sphere of exploitation. To play within the ethical debate is to place oneself in a position of making compromises with the state and capital, using ethical and moral positions. This can be seen in this quote from the ELF’s facts:

“Anyone seeking to create actual positive social and political change must reflect on past attempts throughout history to learn what worked, what didn’t, and what can be taken to aid in the current pursuit. A refusal to make this reflection is also a refusal to make an honest life commitment to the cause of justice and protection of life on this planet.”

What and where is this “justice” coming from? Is it justice we are actually seeking? Justice implies a universal morality that everyone shares. Is it instead a matter of vengeance against civilization for denying one the ability to live a life one chooses?

We return to the use of methods rather than an ideology. A method can be defined as “a procedure, technique, or way of doing something, especially in accordance with a definite plan.” Hence one does not submit to an ideology of protecting the earth, but sees ways and courses to attack what surrounds them – these being the technique or practice. Once an individual or a group can become unhinged from the trap of ideological thinking and self-justification, their desires become in accordance with the interests and aims.

The ELF is referred to by the Department of Homeland Security 3,4 as an organization, which classifies them as a thing with a name or single like-minded identity. In a time of widespread revolt or flourishing milieu it can be useful to have a name in order to communicate why an action was taken and tie it to the continued presence of a certain group or set of ideas, especially to differentiate amongst many tendencies existing within a specific context. However, by taking on a name, a group becomes an organization and becomes reified. It begins to be understood as a thing, an entity in and of itself. This further facilitates identification by authorities who begin to chart and map the movements of an organization or group in order to see where and how it moves, how it functions, what language it uses (environmental, anarchist, communist, etc). Not all investigations are carried out in this way (for example, in the Bombs Case in Chile and the Marini Trials in Italy, anarchists were framed as members of fictitious clandestine organizations), but the naming of oneself as a thing does make it easier for the state to repress the milieu as a whole. It’s easy for the state to comb through the different groups that exist or existed at a determined period of time and go through arrest documents or do outright surveillance (the surveillance and subsequent arrest of the members of Direct Action in Canada can be a perfect example of this). Inevitably they find those who are more above ground and interrogate them about those specific activities, hold them under false pretexts and send in infiltrators to groups who try to establish long-term relationships. Although they don’t know whose entirely involved these practices can eventually lead them to identify suspects.

There is no panacea to repression – it will exist as long as action is taken against the current world. It is only a matter of how deep relationships are rooted in commitment, honesty, and revolutionary courage between those who are partaking in different actions, which will directly correlate to refusal to cooperate with the state. It is worth noting that the ELF as a whole did not consider itself anarchist or revolutionary; it originally spawned from the environmental group Earth First!.

With this in mind, what if a group decided to not give itself a name? Making it harder for the cartographers of power to draw maps, where the longitude and latitude were unable to be connected, diffused and multifarious actions constituted themselves as a thing. Rather than one decisive group with a name, similar to the cellular structure proposed by the ELF, but on the basis of revolutionary activity against the current world.

Violence and Terrorism?

The ELF is critical of the use of violence and harming individuals.5 They state this in their FAQs6 section, in which they give examples of other kinds of actions individuals and groups have taken throughout history. In this point they lack a critical assessment of these different groups, their motivations, and the intentions of their actions. The Boston Tea Party, Suffragette Movement and Gandhi did what they did on the basis of a certain interest to change the existing order through illegal means in some hope for positive change. Essentially these references reinforce an interest tending toward social change, an interest in altering the existing order, not destroying it in its entirety. This position is leftist, not anarchist. Again they constantly referred to this in their referential use of abolish, rather than destroy.7

Violence is a necessary tool for anarchists, one that must be constantly thought about and processed, especially for revolutionary individualist anarchists taking an offensive position aimed at the destruction of the current world and its existent order. This violent methodology should not be blind to a critical eye, rather it should be honed in through various actions, inflicted directly or indirectly against an enemy. This means that one cannot just go out right and say that one “wants to ensure that all of the time life will be taken into consideration”. This statement in and of itself does not take into consideration the war we find ourselves amidst, nor does it consider the positions that others like our enemies, “the people”, etc, take in relation to our position against them. We have to consider that there will be casualties at some point, and have already been casualties. We have many enemies (the judges, lumber companies, the police, scientists, politicians, biotechnologists, the left, the right, etc.) and to not harm them would be due to our own pacification.

If and when we choose to act violently (as defined by the state), we will be called terrorists. There is not doubt about it and it is part of the state’s larger strategy of isolating groups and individuals that oppose it, to fabricate a hostility and an ‘other’. The state creates an enemy of “the people,” the community, or whatever massified term the state uses to distinguish itself and those who identify with it from others.

The Conscious Individual and Self-Motivation

“courage to never yield or submit”- Arthur Schopenhauer

Anarchists at times fall into a very limited view of acting upon their ideas. They build an organization by constantly waiting for this or that moment, yet when its capacity to act is finally reached, what each individual wants is largely misunderstood. Federations, collectives, organizations, and any other large formations are structured in such a way that individuals give up their own agency and desires for a set of guidelines or an ideology. Anarchist individual self-motivation is the ability to consciously understand one’s own desires, intentions, and motivations for acting. Rather than under the banner of a large formation or ideology, actions are taken on one’s own or with other individuals with an informal group who know what they want and why they desire to act together during a certain time period. This requires friendships and relationships that are trusted, understood and long-lasting (the topic of security is left out here because it is such a complex subject, maybe to be visited at another time), rather than political relationships built on an assumed affinity and polite platitudes. These friendships come together and are shaped by mutually-developed histories, individual aims, and intentions. This does not mean one has to act with the same four people all the time, but that there are many relationships one can share which have the ability to come together to act.

Attacking different institutions and mechanisms of power is a leap, one that must be taken if one is interested in seeing this world destroyed. Each attack can be easily played out in one’s head and their physical capacity to act in the most immediate sense, but this leap is a constant evaluation. A question of how to do such things in each instant, a collection of experiences of acting within differing situations that help one gain confidence and courage. Again, these are specific experiences, experiments and practices such as setting fires, throwing rocks through windows, building barricades, scouting for exit and entrance routes, the location of the police, doing research on the placement of different targets within a geographical area, etc.

Through all the critiques I have tried to flesh out specifically about the ELF as a loose network of cells, I would like to make an open proposal to all anarchists critical of the ways anarchists currently engage in North America who desire to see the current world of Capitalism, the State and Civilization destroyed immediately on an international level.

As anarchists, especially the individualist tendency of this milieu, conscious of our own decisions to partake in a practice of refusal and continued attack, we have every method at our disposal. We have the use of different kinds of weapons: fake ids, improvised explosives, guns, disguises, accomplices, safe houses, robberies, etc etc. (manuals for all of which are readily available online).

It is not very easy to take a step in this direction or realm of actually living in an unchained and free way, and it has not been seen in sometime in the North American context. It is a great leap, but a leap nonetheless, for which some may be ready, but others may not. This should not deter solidarity and support in the most specific ways possible towards those who choose to this path.

This proposal is to be an immediate wager on an offensive in the continual war that surrounds every one of us, individually and collectively, whether we consider ourselves anarchists or not. We are part of the existing order; a giant prison with loose and open cells surrounding us. We make conscious choices to continue amid this miserable life (work, school, family, etc) of alienation and imposed exploitation on an international scale.

This proposal is not for a “front” of the organized masses, but for a diffused and open network of cells across North America and internationally. Cells that are not fighting on a militarist front nor see themselves as the “people’s army”. This has nothing to do with the masses being on one’s side, but with the ability for conscious individuals to activate themselves on a plane of existence that is continually practiced in all its composed elements. Similar to the FAI-IRF (Informal Anarchist Federation – International Revolutionary Front), an open network that is anarchist and anti-authoritarian in nature, except without a name. Communiques only released on an as-needed basis when it is necessary to do so, with actions that speak for themselves. Choosing the most critical targets of the existing order.

From defensive to offensive: A metaphysics of refusal and attack

“As our desire to create our lives as we see fit, to realize ourselves to the fullest extent, to reappropriate the conditions of our existence, develops into a real project of revolt against all domination and oppression, we begin to encounter the world with a more penetrating eye.”- Wolfi L.

With this in mind, we as human beings are also vessels, political vessels, conscious and always evolving in the plane of war against the existing world of capital, state and civilization. To negate the cause and effect of our surroundings is to limit oneself to a life of misery as a commodity, to the subjugation of all life, to the domination of time by a sedentary existence, to a society that needs one more human cog to speed itself up, to a civilization that imposes the domination of capital within all social relations. To say we are political vessels is to not just stroke a pen upon paper, but to acknowledge that our everyday lives are a melding of ideas with practices and practices with ideas. To put it another way, to experiment with the hypothesis and wager of what is called life.

Attacking from an offensive position means actions should be rehearsed, understood and gone through many times so that if a plan goes wrong, a group or cell would have the ability to change its movements and tactics very efficiently and quickly.

An offensive position does not wait for our enemies to make a move before attacking them. This means not waiting for someone to be killed by the police and then reacting to it, nor waiting for some crisis in capitalism to strike a group of people and then trying to push the iceberg out of the water. These situations and points do have certain social implications to act within, and provide an opportunity to generalize anarchist methods and illegal practices on a much more social scale that is not isolated to any specific group. But the offensive position is not always social; while the actions themselves may have a social resonance to a specific situation, they can come from an anti-social place of offensive attack, one that is not predetermined nor understood as such a reaction to the state or capital. An attack that is made instead by studying (through the use of different anonymous research technologies – phone books, computers, etc) of the already-existing networks of exploitation and domination in which one or a group of individuals can select a decisive point to hit. This is where the use of the ELF as a method comes in: small cells with an interest in attacking aspects of the civilized order, on the basis of a common hatred of civilization, not based on a common ideology. In its practical sense this means sabotaging railroad lines, destroying electricity infrastructure (telecommunication lines, fiber optics, electrical power lines, cell phone towers or any other unsecured electrical target left open), bombing government buildings or companies that are identified as targets by our individual research.

With this offensive position we must also have the strength and courage to carry on in our individual motivations and intentions. Even if we are carrying on alone, and desire to do so. Understanding when and where to attack our enemies (whether physical or psychological) within the places they reside. To put it another way, this is when we are able to put down the telescope and our limitations based on ideological containers, and open up our field of vision to the colorful world of the kaleidoscope, where the expansive potential of possibilities arise.

This piece is dedicated to:

Conspiracy Cells of FireThe Informal Anarchist FederationThe International Revolutionary Front (Chile, Italy and elsewhere)The Black InternationalTortugaIndividualists Tending Toward the WildThe eco-prisoners of the United States

– we have sent a package with an incendiary cargo to the offices of Greenpeace Mexico –
brief communique from ITS, December 2011

* * *

Since the last public communique from ITS (21 September 2011) many things have happened, we have continued with the attacks that characterize us, but within this short text we will not claim responsibility for them (only one). Since the purpose of sitting down to write this and placing our fingers on a machine again is to deny all the mediocre information and disqualification that is emerging from a minority of leftist cells.

While it is certain that ITS is alien to everything that happens in the virtual world, that is, we are not aware of what happens in the full spectrum from anarchists of action to those who defend passive anarchism, the case is simply that some time ago this information has come to us.

We have heard of a commotion that is forming with respect to our ideas and actions within those circles; they accuse us of being a fabrication of the “repressive state” (phrase that the wretched leftists so love to mention), they say that we are the work of a Machiavellian supernatural evil force that controls the minds of the entire world, they call into question our critical words against all the system’s values because they do not appreciate that someone who has Reason to make them see the Truth.

To begin with, on hearing so many atrocities we decided to remain silence, but seeing that the racket continues we decided to write these lines.

ITS may be everything that “important” (and not so “important”) members of the techno-industrial society have repeatedly said we are, but never accomplices of the System of Domination.

We categorically reject all those labels that they have put on us, we are not “eco-anarchists” or “anarcho-environmentalists” as we have made quite clear in our September 21st communique, if anyone has not understood it, they may read it again.

It is logical that before a discourse and actions like ours there must be reactions from all parties and it seems that the “indignant” wing of anarchism has responded, although not very intelligently. We are against the values that they preach left and right, we are against various concepts that they consider sacred, we are against their strategies because everything that they defend is deposited in the system. Idiots who do not tack the ship and will soon sink, irremediably. Thus they find something (or a lot) “strange” about ITS, they find themselves to be like civilized people within a forest of sylvan vegetation when they read our communiques, they do not know where they are. Confused leftists who perhaps some day will learn or else will remain stopped in the quicksand, immobile and passive, waiting for their environmental conditions to consume them. But that in reality does not concern us in the least.

ITS has seen an analyzed that the leftists are a real threat who only seek to reform the system and create alternatives in order to “fight” against it, but (although they don’t realize it) they are useless, since this only feeds it. The war against academics and technologists is declared (that is more than clear and we have shown it) but also the war against leftism, thus we have sent a package with incendiary cargo to the offices of Greenpeace Mexico (which arrived [according to the authorities] on 25 November of this year).

The package was sent to the activist Alejandro Olivera, who insists on carrying out hypocritical campaigns in “favor” of the environment in order to gain public notoriety, his psychological necessities make his activism a pathetic surrogate activity that sugarcoats artificial necessities like self-realization that he acts like it is his “moral duty” to do the “right thing” in the face of the devastation that ecosystems are undergoing.

Surely Olivera will not realize this (since his reasoning does not allow for more) because of this action, he will not realize that Greenpeace is one of so many highly reformist organizations, that they only want to change the laws for other ones in order to illusorily achieve a supposed rescue of the Earth, and here comes the threat–the change of economic, political, social and cultural aspects so that the system continues on its path. (On this point we will not say more, it will have its time when we write a long communique that brings all the rational explanations to such attacks.)

Before this kind of leftist organization we respond with direct attempts, all those who seek a world that is “more just,” “more humane” and “more green” are on our list, ITS have finished with consideration, have fininished with what they will say, we do not pretend to be “well-intentioned activists” with a moderate and good image, we are a group of radical environmentalists, anti-industrialists of a terrorist stripe (towards society and its defenders).

ITS shows its true face, we go to the central point, the fierce defense of Wild Nature (including human); we do not negotiate, we carry out our task with the necessary materials, without compassion and accepting the responsibility of the act. Our instincts make us do it, since (as we have said before) we are in favor of natural violence against civilized destruction.

All leftists be warned (and by leftists we refer as much to those of the left as to those of the right): ITS does not hesitate to make an attempt on the physical integrity of any one of you, you are our enemies and thus our threats will materialize in bullets and dynamite.

With this said, we declare that we will not make further mention about the attacks of the leftist eunichs for the moment; they do not merit any consideration, since these mediocre people (with much lack of attention) act toward the impossible (and go to ridiculous extremes) in order to gain notoriety within some movement (a completely pathetic deed); as they say: the fish dies by its own mouth.*

To the humiliating leftist mythomaniacs who seek to destroy our discourse and attacks with false arguments founded not in Reason but instead in speculation, irrationality and animism, do not expect our attacks to stop, do not expect dialogue with ITS, do not expect any answer to questions you may have; from ITS, only expect the worst…

Individualidades tendiendo a lo salvaje

(Individualists tending toward the wild)

____________________________
* An expression referring to the way in which things that one said carelessly can return with a vengeance. It seems (it’s not quite clear) that the expression’s sensibility is that humans live in and by words in the way that fish live in and by water, and so do we also die by them. – transl

Health, comrade Gabriel! Health, comrade Tamara! Health, comrade Luciano! Health, comrade Camenisch! Health, comrades of the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire held captive in Greece! Health to all those who fight for Total Liberation!

The coordination of the unmanageable struggle solidifies and extends over the whole world. The anarchist fire and explosion leave their mark and awaken libertarian conscience. From Santiago de Chile to Mexico City, the chaotic night is illuminated with gasoline and black powder in solidarity with our captive comrades. Montevideo, Lima and Portland raise themselves to anarchic arson. In Greece, in Germany, in Italy and Argentina, the roar of dynamite is heard. The fire spreads from Russia to Indonesia. The condemnation of the States is unanimous no matter the ideological color of whatever governments. The prisons of the world keep hostage our sisters and brothers in struggle. With this horizon and in the face of the extension of the anarchic struggle, the attacks and slander from the opportunists on the left side of Capital were to be expected. Leftist liberals and diseased Bolsheviks sealed with french kisses their disgusting alliances in search of power, and anarchists threatened once again to ruin the party; thus they call us the “public enemy number one” and hasten their onslaught. Toward these ends they do not have any scruples in carrying out the orders of the State and offering themselves as volunteer police. In the final assessment, they do not fight to destroy the system of domination but to “transform it.” Leninists and leftist liberals fight to take State power, not for its elimination. Thus in Greece and in Chile, they hold delegations and public posts, defending the system of domination from the anarchists, as we see recently in Greece with their defense of Parliament.

Leftists and Leninists rely on semantics, word games and doublespeak to camouflage their intentions, trying to mislead the naive with a grotesque gymnastics that try to establish a supposed difference between instituted Power and instituting Power. Crushing to death the supposed goodness of their “Popular Power” (the same shit in a different bottle!) and pulling out of their sleeve an “anarchism” aligned with Power and inclined toward “proletarian” dictatorships and populist governments, they intend to give body to an incompatible mishmash which puts a Leninist project into practice with a libertarian discourse, with the objective of halting the anarchic contagion and attracting the ingenuous to their ranks.

The opportunists from “saboteamos.info” adhere to this strategy with their attacks on the Individualists Tending toward the Wild (ITS). “Communique” after “communique” (and even with a shit sandwich they call “documentary”), they try to present the anti-civilization anarcho-environmentalists who make up the cells of ITS as “government agents” and “as a distraction from the population in order to intimidate and characterize anti-systemic expressions.” With the Cantinflesque language that characterizes them and with their use and abuse of leftist verborrea [3], they try to sow distrust and division through slander, suspicion and defamation. Old techniques frequently used by the mercenaries of the system of domination, as by the volunteers on the left side of Capital aspiring to Power.

We may have theoretical differences and discussions with the comrades of ITS (polemicizing always in a comradely way in a constant attempt to actualize ideas and for the construction of a unitary critique attuned to the reality of the anarchist struggle) but we have never disagreed over the methods used, understanding anti-authoritarian violence and propaganda by the deed as valid practices in accordance with our ethical principles. With this, we not only want to make clear that we recognize their anarchist anti-civilization trajectory but also that we see nothing “strange” nor “suspicious” about a direct attack against the representatives of the techno-industrial system of domination; nor do we see any difference between an attack made against a smaller or larger piece of shit, since what matters is to realize the attack against the system of domination, putting into practice permanent conflictuality and, above all, choosing the target that entails the least risk for ourselves. This has been the basis of the practical coordination between the new anarchic insurrectionalism and the anti-civilization anarcho-environmentalism.

From their virtual “reality,” the opportunists of “saboteamos.info,” playing at “investigative journalism,” rely on the same strategy recently implemented by so-called Carolina Romero and those who write under the name Notices from the Rebellion, demonstrating a fictitious dichotomy that tries to present two positions within the anarchist movement: “the good anarchists” and “the bad anarchists,” praising dead anarchists and defaming the living ones, promoting the old saying: “The best anarchist is the one who is dead.”

They intend to use to their favor that portion of anarchism that we have constantly pointed out as immobilist and evolutionist, opposed to anarchic action and partisan of waiting, of quantitative growth and of centralist bureaucratic organization; nevertheless, to them we declare that we can distinguish perfectly well (despite our differences) between these anarchists and the anarcho-Leninist fetal monstrosity aligned with the populist governments and “proletarian” dictatorships that they try to promote. We are all aware of this intention that attempts to mislead the unsuspecting. An irrefutable proof is the note dedicated to Carolina Romero in the pages of the most recent issue of the periodical Apoyo Mutuo, giving an account of the slander and defamation by this opportunist at the service of the Cuban hierarchy against Cuban anarchist comrades.

But these virtual “saboteurs,” in addition to slandering and defaming, cynically lie, trying to sow discord and division between affinities. Likewise they have involved the Chilean comrades from Liberación Total in their bickering, pretending that they received “confidential” information from this site for the diffusion of global anarchic action, in order to then conclude that it deals with their very particular paranoid and bad-intentioned “interpretation.” Likewise they mention in their endless bullshit affinity groups and even signatories of this new Joint Declaration and sites of solidarity with unmanageable anarchism (Viva la Anarquía, Portal OACA, and Culmine) of proven integrity, creating doubt and pretending to have a nonexistent support from these anarchist counter-information media closely in affinity with our project of struggle. It becomes clear that it is not a coincidence that this scenario presents itself here, while in Germany and Switzerland, a similar campaign goes on the march and from anonymity there appears a letter to the anarchist Galaxy, critiquing the unmanageable action of comrades held captive by the State.

We know well how these opportunists expend themselves, more now that the whole leftist pile of shit closes ranks in the face of next year’s elections. The opportunist rats also prepare to board the ship of López Hablador [4], discovering in the former PRI-ist the new messiah of the Mexican left in search of that supposed “Popular Power” they so preach. It is not an accident that the subcomediante [5] faced with this moderates his tone, describing him now as a “scoundrel,” nor is it an accident that la Otra Campaña(supposedly created to confront the electoral campaign) keeps absolute silence toward the new presidential plans of López Hablador, after accusing him in the past of being a “corrupt rat at the service of the powerful.” They try to disguise Peje with the glowing look [6], presenting him as the Mexican Chavez, Morales or Castro. Thus they view with profound distaste the extension of unmanageable anarchism — it worries them that the contagion is spreading. They know that for us anarchists it is the same fucking shit one government or another; it means the same to us that there is a rat from the left or the right in Power. Anarchists (as the word indicates) are against all authority, against all government, against all Power. Thus, we are not of the left nor the right. We do not place ourselves on one side or another of the system of domination: WE ARE AGAINST ALL DOMINATION. Thus, whoever wins, we will continue in struggle until Total Liberation because the only thing we have “below and to the left”[7] is our left ovary or testicle (as the case may be) — NOTHING MORE. And in our hearts the only thing that beats with force is Anarchy…

The times of the elections are approaching, and the choice is ours:[8]

“I want to live among people who are conscious that we live in a war. A war against life, against the spirit. I want to live among people who don’t look down at their feet, or won’t look you in the eyes when you speak of struggle or insurrection, because In their heart they know they have surrendered, and because—maybe, just maybe—they never really hated the system. Among people who have not been bought, who did not take the pills they were offered, because they preferred to struggle with their feeling of pathologized anxiety than to live in the dead zone. People who don’t pretend to be struggling when it is obvious that what they are doing is turning a battlefield into a garden. I want to be in a place where the war is admissible.”

—anonymous Spanish poet

(Out of) Controls

Pages

Contributors Wanted!

Serious about independent, grassroots media? Dedicated to total liberation and revolutionary social change from below? Wanna write for Guerrilla News? Create a free WordPress account and then send the email address you registered under to guerrillanews@riseup.net (If you do not wish to register an account, we also accept submissions by email at the same address, which may be anonymous.) BE THE MEDIA!

Email Subscription

Cetegories & Topics

Archives

Disclaimer

Guerrilla News does not necessarily condone or agree with everything posted on this site. We do not endorse or engage in any of the dumb and dangerous activities documented herein. As middle-class beneficiaries of capitalist iniquity, we have no incentive to contest the structures that guarantee our special privileges, nor do we ever do so—just ask our colleagues. We're so busy cashing in on others' insurgency that we wouldn't have time to participate even if we wanted to—honest, officer!

But it’s not anymore. Three years to the day of the first post to This Is Our Job, I’ve decided to end this particular anarchist project in order to devote myself to other anarchist projects. Primarily, I want more time … Continue reading →

As we’ve already stated, the police will be attacked, whether with bullets, fire, or explosives. We call the things we do by their names, and we want our comrades to do the same. We’re not going to say we’re carrying … Continue reading →

On Tuesday, October 2, the sentences were announced in the second trial of the Fire Cells Conspiracy Revolutionary Organization. The trial began in December 2011 and dealt with three bombings carried out by the Fire Cells Conspiracy in 2009: at … Continue reading →

Operation Ardire prisoner Giulia Marziale has just released two fascinating communiqués about the ludicrousness of the charges against her and about the hypocrisy of people who sympathize with political dissidents elsewhere while condemning those in their own backyard.

From Liberación Total (September 14, 2012): CLAIM FOR REVOLUTIONARY CRIMINAL ATTACK ON LA FLORIDA PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE We attacked the Southern Prosecutor’s Office because it symbolizes law enforcement. From there, people are sent to prison. People are sentenced for crimes and … Continue reading →

Wednesday, September 5 The four Fire Cells Conspiracy members refused to attend this trial session, thereby showing their opposition to the vindictive transfers imposed on them during the summer, as they were brought back to Korydallos Prison in Athens just … Continue reading →

In this most recent letter from Stefano Gabriele Fosco, who ran the Culmine blog before he was arrested in the context of Operation Ardire, he fires back at those who have been criticizing anarchist prisoners for using elements of the … Continue reading →

Translated by Actforfree: source “NO MATTER WHAT IT IS DONT CONSIDER IT LITTLE LIVE YOUR ERA WITH COURAGE” GOETHE 5 years after the armed clash in Dafni and nothing changed, 5 years and you are here, 5 years and you … Continue reading →

Translated by Actforfree: source In the early hours of Monday 30/3/15 we chose to place an incendiary device in the offices of the local administration of the socialist-democrat government. We chose not to completely torch the offices. We leave it … Continue reading →

Translated by Act for free: source Athens – Dafni: Banner drop by comrades in the memory of Lambros Foundas A group of anarchist comrades, as well as members of the Radiozones of Subversive Expression and Mpalothia web site, went to … Continue reading →

On Thursday 26th March 2015 we make an arson attack on a police car in Olomouc city. Attack against repressive machinery means fighting for freedom. Because where repression is needed, there is no place for liberty to bloom. There is … Continue reading →

Today at 1pm in Cardiff city centre we held a demonstration in solidarity with the hunger striking members of CCF and their friends and families. We handed out flyers explaining their situation and demands while shouting chants in English and … Continue reading →

Over the night of March 15th and 16th, slingshots were fired at Balfour Beatty on Carter Road, Bishopsworth and The Post building close to Old Market, breaking several windows on each. Balfour Beatty would never let something stupid like the … Continue reading →

Actforfree receives: From: radio98fm hunger strike (english spot) Update on the hunger strike of the political prisoners in the Greek prisons, March 2015 In solidarity to the imprisoned hunger strikers we have created and are sending you an audio … Continue reading →

Actforfree receives: The suffocating and authoritarian world reserved for us its most vicious reality, the experience of living in physical incarceration, the tough consequence of a dangerous adventure. Living the existing dystopia, we come up against the horror of the … Continue reading →

Translated by Actforfree Source 25.3.15 Another state murder in Domokos prisons A prisoner from Pakistan, who was held in E2 wing of Domokos prisons (c’type) committed suicide in the disciplinary cell. He asked to be transferred to a hospital and … Continue reading →

Today in the morning around 6 a.m., the hunger striker Mihalis Nikolopoulos almost suffered a heart attack as his heart rate was 25 beats per minute and his blood pressure 8/2,5. One and a half dose of injectable atropine was administered to him as a single dose wasn’t enough. His state of health is currently [...]

Via squat.net: This morning in Operation Piñata (following Pandora in December) cops have raided social centres and arrested people (at least 26) in Barcelona, Madrid, Palencia and Granada. La 13-14 in Madrid announced it was being raided this morning. CSOA La Redonda in Granada released a communique condemning the raids, which they said occurred without [.. […]

Today at 1pm in Cardiff city centre we held a demonstration in solidarity with the hunger striking members of CCF and their friends and families. We handed out flyers explaining their situation and demands while shouting chants in English and Greek. After the demonstration we hung a banner in the city and scattered flyers from [...]

The moment the following words were written, we’re on the 25th day of hunger strike, for the liberation of Christos and Gerasimos Tsakalos’ mother, as well as the second one’s girlfriend. The pre-trial detention of our two comrades’ relatives was an act of revenge by the judicial power against us, in retaliation for the escape [...]

We, the prisoners of Korydallos prison, decided to scale up our reactions towards this insanity and injustice evolving in front of our eyes. For about a month now, the judicial council that deals with the release of a 60-year-old mother and the wife of our fellow prisoner, Gerasimos Tsakalos, ostentatiously turns a deaf ear, playing [...]

Statement of FAI/IRF Poetry of fire cell On Thursday 26th March 2015 we make an arson attack on a police car in Olomouc city. Attack against repressive machinery means fighting for freedom. Because where repression is needed, there is no place for liberty to bloom. There is no place without repression. Repression is an instrument [...]

In solidarity to the imprisoned hunger strikers we have created and are sending you an audio file of updates related to the struggle of the hunger strikers in English. Please communicate this to as many counter-information blogs/sites/radios/media as possible. Victory to the struggle of the hunger strikers. http://radio98fm.espiv.net/DIAFORA/EnglishSpotHunge […]

Hi, we have another update about the eviction resistance in Dublin! Yesterday (Friday) we had court again, this time the judge had made a decision. He said the Injunction was successful, but he would delay it until May 4th. This means they will not try to evict us until then, but after that they will [...]

Inter Arma received and translated: Comrade Damiano Bolano begun the hunger strike weighing 90.1 kg, and has now reached 73.5 kg and suffers from a skin infection almost all over his body. Comrade Mihalis Nikolopoulos from weighing 78.5 kg, has now reached 66.5, while showing significant bradycardia with a pulse in the range of 40-44 [...]

What is so special about this site? I have a text I’d like to see in the library. May I submit it? I uploaded something, but you censored me! What about my zine? What about my scans? Hey, you started without me. Can I join you? What about support for other languages? Tell us about your technology. Why don […]

April 2014 December 2013 update (2) The bright side The dark side December 2013 update April 2014 A lightweight torrent (English only, HTML + sources) has been hacked together. You can grab it here: theanarchistlibrary-en-2014-04-25.torrent. The torrent doesn’t come from the library, but from reti who wanted (and managed) to put it to […]

The torrent PDF 56k users/crappy connections/various situations Search plugin for Calibre Code The torrent A torrent release is available here (October 4 2014). It ships the CD/DVD images with the full archive of this site and of its sister sites: Macedonian Finnish Russian Spanish Serbo-Croatian PDF of various size, plain and i […]

We’ve closed down the Jabber server and have moved back to Internet Relay Chat (IRC). The chat is now hosted on the servers run by Freenode. You can access it by using your preferred IRC client and pointing it to: server: chat.freenode.net channel: #anarchistlibrary Please see http://freenode.net/irc_servers.shtml for some helpful information about accessing […]

The library has been upgraded, with a couple of notable improvements: new mobile-friendly layout enhanced bookbuilder improved PDF style The old files have been archived in a torrent release, which you can grab here: anarchist-libraries-2014-10-04.torrent. The torrent ships the usual collection of ISO files, meant to be extracted or burned on a CD (for small […]

Introduction Installation Essentials Full-featured installation (EPUB) Full-featured installation (PDF) Introduction The texts stored on the libraries are formatted with a dialect of the Emacs Muse markup, which is described in deep details in the manual. The files are pure plain text (with the popular and ubiquitous UTF-8 […]

Author: The Invisible CommitteTitle: To our friendsDate: October 2014Notes: Two chapters from "To our friends" - the rest will be posted here upon completion.Source: Retrieved on March 31st, 2015 from http://bloom0101.org/?parution=to-our-friends

Author: Fallon Rouiller and Amélie TrudeauTitle: Open Letter from Amelie and FallonDate: February 14 2015Source: Retrieved on March 27 2015 from http://en.contrainfo.espiv.net/2015/02/17/mexican-prisons-open-letter-of-amelie-pelletier-and-fallon-poisson-february-14-2015/

Author: C.T. Butler and Amy RothsteinTitle: On Conflict and Consensus: a handbook on Formal Consensus decisionmakingDate: 1987Notes: Food Not Bombs Publishing295 Forest Avenue #314Portland, ME 041011.800.569.4054(c) C.T. Butler, 1987. This internet version is free. You may copy it to other computers, and you may print it. If you’d prefer a pretty printed boo […]

Author: Alexander BerkmanTitle: What Is Communist Anarchism?Date: 1929Notes: From Alexander Berkman, Now and After: The ABC of Communist Anarchism, New York, Vanguard Press, 1929.Source: Retrieved on March 12th, 2009 from dwardmac.pitzer.edu

I like Okapy and Yosemite's comments, especially Y's "maybe conspiracy theories are partly a reaction to the horrifying mundanity of domination." They cover all the points I would have made, except I would also make room for acknowledging the issue of skepticism. Conspiracy theory shares with anarchy a disbelief or distrust of the dominan […]

I think that these points are valuable, yes. I know anarchist men who talk over people or interrupt women, and it makes sense that not only that guy is criticized and tries to be mindful, but also that the women he interacts with learn how to do that themselves. Sometimes there is a moralistic criticism of this mentality that sounds something like "Patr […]

i don't understand these questions that ask "is it ok"? no one can determine whether something is ok for you or not but you, ultimately. if the question is: can i do anarchist things as a union member... in my opinion it is just like other jobs. it is neither more nor less anarchist than any other social work job, and in fact qualifies as such […]

[sorry for the wall-of-text, my posts need an expand/collapse button. :(] Basics of effective communications - know your audience, tailor your message to that audience... Doesn't mean lie to them, or pander to their sacred cows; just use language, and concepts, and metaphors, that they are familiar with. We accept new ideas relatively quickly when w […]

i think i would say that there are two components to "state"ness. one is (as fba delineates) a body of people who, simply put, have a monopoly on violence (with the accoutrements that go along with that -- history creation, social structuring, etc). this deserves to be fleshed out more than i'm going to do right now... the other is a more phil […]

Arm yourself with righteousness. The more certain you are that you are right and knowing that they are wrong will give you strength when you need it.' They are criminals that use violence to control others and you are seeking to end that matrix. Look to people that are taking the struggle to them for examples, here are two. MarcStevens.net He will show […]

My short answer: not much. My longer answer: not much. But, why? Admittedly, I'm far more acquainted with Plato than with Confucius, but have read enough of the latter to understand the inherent tyranny of reified 'higher ideals' so blatantly in favor of a ruling class structure, I have no affinity for it whatsoever. Never have. Most likely, […]

Well again, as anarcho communist99 said, I am an Anarcho communist and can only answer in my own opinion. I believe in the three chance rule, you ask someone peacefully twice to stop as they are doing if they become excessively aggressive and threatening then self defence is permitted. However I am a general pacifist (for most things but not everything) and […]

dot's comment and link are a good start and provocation. I would explore this site more thoroughly to find particular questions whose answers get at some of the practical questions you have. I'll include a couple links after this for more specifically anarcho-communist info, as many answers here do not come from that perspective, but I'd encou […]

Note: This is in no way an Antagonistic question, I just legitimately lack full understanding in this respect. Something that I hear a lot from Anarchists is how wherever you go you cannot escape "Corporate Propaganda" and the sort. I occasionally hear this from Mutualists and free market socialists, but, wouldn't we fall to the same ills wi […]

"I think probably the most honest thing I ever heard about the horseshoe theory was when, trying to wrap my head around where an anarchist would fit in it, I asked the teacher of my high school civics class that very question and she looked at me and said, "anarchists aren't even on this chart." twenty years on, that has proven to be the […]

Here's why this anarchist doesn't support this scheme: 1. I accept little to none of its reification: its language; morality; unspoken/unexamined presuppositions; the logic derived thereof; its intentions; its a-historical, un-lived 'theory'; as well as any attempt in imposing it all now. 2. I have no desire to police myself or others by […]

May I quote Epicurus, because his words still define what I think about death, and it seems very compatible to an anarchist perspective. It's in his "Letter to Menoeceus" : "Accustom yourself to believing that death is nothing to us, for good and evil imply the capacity for sensation, and death is the privation of all sentience; therefore […]

julian assange might be an argument for a "yes" answer. but of course there are many analyses of that whole situation. i guess my followup question would be: how are you defining "power"? in this culture, celebrity does bring with it a certain kind of power, and so assange does seem like a strong argument.

I started taking responsibility of my actions and the best ideology which allowed me to true take control was Anarchy. I have never looked back only fight harder to undermine that which inhibits me for truly existing.

What could phenomenological anarchist principles? or how can one set up some basic principles to describe anarchy? Very interested in the importance, strength and importance of calling oneself an anarchist.

Kaczynski reminds me a lot of Netchaiev. They share a kind of what I would call romantic nihilism. Not "Nihilism" with a capital N. , but a "kind of". They share in common this very hegelian idea that the more the people suffer, the more they're going to be "revolutionnary". Curiously, that's also a common idea among m […]

AN anarchist critique of efficiency would certainly include division of labor--as part of the cogification of people. i believe this critique would start by troubling the definition of efficiency, and who determines it. for example: are assembly line workers making a product? or are they creating themselves? which is the assembly line efficient for?...